The main thing that is wrong with church congregations is that they are made up of people, and people come to every enterprise with personality issues, baggage of all sorts, their own chemistry which will not meld with some other persons. Thus conflict from time to time is inevitable. Church conflict resolution expert Speed Leas classifies disagreements from a "level one," meaning we have a problem to resolve, up to "level five," intractable situations in which there are typically three key players: the persecutor, the victim, and the rescuers. Anyone can have any of those roles.
When intractable situations arise, congregational protestant churches usually divide, what I call the "amoeba syndrome." These days that process is harder to follow, as split-offs tend to adopt the entertainment church practice of hiding their denominational identity, calling the church by some buzzword, like Solace or Hillspring. In the Catholic traditions, we do not and cannot divide because we have something called a bishop who handles (or occasionally mishandles) the situation, meeting with people, studying the problem and, when needed, moving some laity and clergy to other parishes. This is one of the ways in which the bishop functions as centre of church unity. Emphasis is always on maintaining the health and Christian mission of the faith family. In rare cases, the bishop will excommunicate someone and, indeed, priests have that authority, but it is used very,very rarely. We try to give people the benefit of the doubt, work to promote reconciliation, and avoid judgmentalism.
Today's gospel [Mt. 18: 15-20] portrays Jesus as offering guidelines for dealing with church conflict and many assume this is fresh material, but in fact Our Lord is simply quoting Deuteronomy. Do remember that Matthew's congregation, releasing this gospel around 80 C.E., fifty years after the end of Jesus' earthly ministry, is a truly Jewish-Christian congregation which does not dispense the Law but promotes Jesus' torqued-up version we read in the Sermon on the Mount. The historical Jesus, of course, did not ostracize Gentiles and tax collectors, as the text implies. Pharisees did. Nevertheless, this simple pattern of engagement can be a very helpful model in reconciliation: engagement one-on-one, then in group, and finally to the institutional level.
I glean some interesting thoughts and inferences. First, those who lead the church, like the rest of the membership, are called to be loving towards others -- in and out of church -- and to be focussed on the needs of the other person, helping the fellow-Christian to fullness of life. Really listening can be essential in that process. Likewise the fundamental equality of all Christians (regardless of role) is important to recognize; you may recall Saint Peter having a God moment in which he realizes that God has no favourites. Hence, God loves us equally -- male and female, gay and straight, old and young, and those all across the colour and ethnic spectrum. All are beloved and to be respected and served. We strive for unity in diversity. God seeks community, hence where any "two or three' gather God is with us and provides the tools, inspiration, and commitment to resolve our conflicts.
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